Xsyon News! March 4th

 

I was reading the new updates and I think that Xsyon made some positive decisions and made some good decisions and we now have our full server wipe. However, my big problem is now two server?! It is not big enough player base for two servers ^_^ sigh… here is the Update notes:

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Update March 4

Hello everyone!
Before arguments get out of hand I will make some sure things are clear up front. I see already many misconceptions about the War and Peace servers.

 

• Both servers will start off the same.
• Both will have PvP with consequences.
• The Peace server is not a PvE server.
• Safe zones will be removed during the prelude on the War server when towns can defend themselves. This is not a Chaos or griefer server, but a server for players that want tribal warfare and conquest.
  

The differences between servers will be slight. This will not require a lot of additional development, just a matter of settings and switches in the code.

• Both servers will evolve with each player base. The plan is and will always be to evolve with what the player base wants.
• The servers are an option. You can play on both if you like.

 

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Update March 4

Hello Xsyon citizens!

I'd like to recap what's been going on for the past two weeks and give an update on what we're working on and what he have planned for the coming week.

On February 18th we attempted a final year zero wipe. As our dowload server shared a connection and firewall with our game servers, the heavy download traffic reached our bandwidth limit, interfering with game traffic and causing severe lag. This lag exposed various exploits and problems with tribe and totem placement which in turn led to crashes and bad data being saved. On the 19th, we decided to push forward the official launch for two weeks so that we could resolve the problems that surfaced. The major issues were as follows:

Heavy lag due to bandwidth limit:
This was resolved a week ago as we set up two new download servers separate from our game servers.
Tribe and totem exploits:

These were fixed and confirmed throught testing.
Corrupted data saving:

The saving system was revised with additional error checking, double back ups and automatic shut downs in the case of bad data being created. After a few days of server crashes and shut downs, both forced and due to problems in the code, we corrected all issues and since then the saving system has been running smoothly and rollbacks, if needed, are small and without data corruption.

Built up lag due to simultaneous terraforming activity and terrain actions:

After some optimizations we haven't been able to reproduce this lag in the past few days. We are wary that it may happen again, however. We've added some additional checks and measures so that if lag does build up again, we will be able to pinpoint the exact cause much easier in the future.

With all this out of the way, we are nearly ready for the final wipe and real start of Xsyon!
Here's what is currently in motion:

1) We will proceed with a clean slate for the Year Zero start.
The totem survey that we sent out resulted in over 70% of players that placed totems and roughly 90% of players that responded in favor of a clean start. In addition, many totems were not saved properly or were missing from the saved data.

2) The game will start with two game servers: War and Peace.
The main reason for this is to handle our current game population and anticipated growth over the next few months.

Although the lands beyond the green mist were created a long time ago, we spent a lot of time this past year improving the central active Tahoe zone. Our terrain artists are currently revising and improving the outer lands to match the central zone. The first expansion zone should be ready by the end of April. Currently, however, we can't clear the mist so we are limited to the Tahoe starting zone.

This limitation along with the recent addition of homesteads is crowding the starting zone with our current population. This is driving creatures too quickly into the green mist and not allowing enough active wilderness areas for creatures to breed. We have some additional changes to creature AI that will help resolve this issue, but at this point a two server solution is necessary.

Additionally, this solution will help with the land rush and reduce lag when the servers are full.
With an obvious existing split in the community between players who want more of a construction game and players that want to focus on PvP, we decided to use this as an opportunity for War and Peace servers.
 

• Both servers will allow for PvP.
• Both servers will retain our anti-griefing policies.
• Both servers will start off the same and change over time.
• Both servers will evolve with the player community.
• Players will have the option to create characters on both servers.
  

The War server will have safe zones removed during the Prelude. The plan is to evolve this server to focus more on tribal warfare and conquest as quickly as possible.
The Peace server will retain its safe zones with tribes having the options to engage in tribal warfare or allow PvP on tribal lands. This server will evolve more for the crafting and building community.

3) The final wipe and land rush will proceed in a controlled manner.
On the day of the final wipe, players will be able to enter the game and form their tribe charters, but not claim any land. This will allow tribes to form their groups and find their locations and then log on.

On the second day, players will be able to claim land, but terraforming will be turned off and combat will not be allowed on the Peace server. This will allow players to claim their lands without entire tribes being online, and once totems are placed, players can log off to reduce stress on the servers.

On the third day, everything will be turned on as normal and game play can begin.

We will do this do reduce potential lag and chaos. The goal of the early entry is for tribes and players to settle in, while the game will officially start with a creature reset on the 15th.

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What's next:

We are currently preparing the War and Peace servers. These are at a new location that should provide us slightly better connectivity to players around the world. This won't result in a huge difference from our current game server, but any improvement is welcome. These should be completely set up by tomorrow.
A new launcher is almost ready but needs to be tested

once the game servers are fully prepared.
I'm working on a few fixes and changes that I want done before the final wipe. If we encounter any built up lag in game tonight or this weekend, we will have to take some time to work on it as well.

As of now, I estimate we'll be ready by the middle of this coming week. I will post an update tomorrow to keep everyone informed of our progress.